In the past 10 to 20 years, Latin America has come to acquire an organized politics of race. By an “organized politics of race,” I mean a situation in which racial categories are simultaneously and explicitly the subjects of state policy, deployed in claims-making by subordinate groups, mobilized as constituencies by political actors, such as social movements and political parties, and used by social scientists to describe and diagnose social inequalities. To be sure, racial identities mattered previously; racism has been widespread, people have used racialized language to describe others, and economic and social hierarchies have paralleled racial differences. However, explicit mobilization around racial categories—by both society and the state— marks a new trend for the region. This chapter addresses a few related questions. What is the nature of and the implications of the new racialized public policies being adopted in the region? Do they work? Will they raise awareness of discrimination and reduce inequality? The arguments are intended to constitute the basis for an ongoing conversation. The organized politics of race does not look the same everywhere and has proceeded farther in some countries than in others. The first part of this chapter shows that, because the historical context of the state’s role in race making differs significantly in Latin America from the United States, takenfor-granted racial categories used by states and scholars mean different things on the ground. The second part argues that the emergence of race-based public policies has involved a racial recategorization project launched by elites, a project that does not always resonate with the targeted populations. The third part of the chapter briefly analyzes two major experiences of race-based public policies: university admissions quotas in Brazil and reserved seats for “black communities” in Colombia. These two experiences demonstrate that race-based policies have succeeded in raising awareness and broadening discussions about inequality. However, they mark an imperfect beginning to a longer and much-needed national conversation about race.

Jane Junn, University of Southern CaliforniaTaeku Lee, University of California, Berkeley

“[These] data illustrate the phenomenon that aggregation can obscure internal diversity within the broader category of Asian Americans, resulting in inaccurate conclusions about the model-minority status of this racialized group.”

Asian Americans occupy a defined and by now accepted corner of America’s “ethnoracial pentagon.” Yet ponder “inequality” and “Asian American” is unlikely to come to mind. In fact, kindle what we think we know about Asian Americans and the light shines on their storied heights of educational and socioeconomic achievement, or perhaps the remarkable within-group diversity that calls to question the very coherence of the pan-ethnic category itself. This chapter explores the ways in which Asian Americans are a meaningful, even critical group to consider in thinking about race and inequality in the United States. It discusses in detail the way in which the social meanings attached to the category “Asian” have shifted in the United States from a designation that foreclosed opportunities for full citizenship to a valorized position of a “model minority” within the racial order. Despite this valorization, the chapter points out that Asian Americans continue to face discrimination and underrepresentation in a number of fields in American life. These empirical realities debunk arguments that portray racial gaps between whites and people of color in the United States as epiphenomena of socioeconomic status. Finally, it demonstrates how the “model-minority” narrative obscures the rampant inequalities that exist among different ethnic subgroups. In contemporary social and political discourse on class inequalities in the United States, discussion of Asian Americans is relatively scarce compared with examinations of the unequal fortunes of other groups of racialized Americans. Nevertheless, Asian Americans have been consistently and throughout the history of the United States separated into distinct categories of race, beginning with the earliest classification of Chinese in 1870 and continuing with the multiplicity of Asian race categories in the 2010 US Census. Although remaining classified as racial minorities, the construction of Asian Americans in the last several decades as a model minority highlights their relatively high levels of educational attainment and economic status while simultaneously ignoring the diversity of the population. This obscures the wide variation in resources among ethnic groups within the broader set of Asian Americans and persistently discounts unequal opportunities and outcomes in the United States.

Michael C. Dawson, University of ChicagoMegan Ming Francis, University of Washington

“To explore the role of race and class in black politics today, we first must take into account how historical decisions have shaped the landscape for blacks.”

We are at a critical moment in the state of race relations in the United States. The years 2013–2015 marked the 50th anniversaries of important milestones in the Civil Rights Movement. In 1963, Martin Luther King, Jr., delivered his stirring “I Have a Dream” speech at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. President Lyndon B. Johnson signed into law the most sweeping piece of civil rights legislation in July 1964. In 1965, Congress passed the Voting Rights Act, which explicitly forbade voter-disenfranchisement measures and opened the pathway for a generation of black people to vote for the first time in their lives. These historic events were the culmination of decades of struggle by women and men who risked their lives for freedom and justice. However, even when a process of struggle culminates in transformative events, the reality of everyday life shows that significant social change is complicated and slow. On August 28, 1963, in the shadow of Abraham Lincoln and amid thousands of onlookers, King stood on the Washington Mall and observed that in the 100 years since the Emancipation Proclamation, “the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination….America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked ‘insufficient funds.’” Now, 50 years later, it is necessary to ask two important questions: How far has the United States come? And where do we go from here?

John Sides, Associate Professor of Political ScienceGeorge Washington University

Professor Sides studies political behavior in American and comparative politics. His current research focuses on American elections, the politics of U.S. fiscal policy, and the influence of factual information on public opinion. His work has appeared in the American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, American Politics Research, British Journal of Political Science, Journal of Politics, Political Communication, Political Studies, Presidential Studies Quarterly, Research and Politics, and Legislative Studies Quarterly. He helped found and contributes to The Monkey Cage, a site about politics and political science that is now part of the Washington Post. Read more.

Twitter is always an active platform and great networking tool, partiularly during large conferences and events. The APSA 2016 Annual Meeting, located in Philadelphia, PA, was no different with attendees sharing all types of thought on the platform. One of our conference attendees, Eric Vorst, decided to do an analysis of what people were saying and gained quite a bit of interest from the twittersphere. We reached out to Eric to give us some closing analysis of #APSA2016 from a twitter perspective.

Eric C. Vorst
Network Analysis of #APSA2016

Eric C. Vorst is a PhD candidate in Political Science at the University of Missouri – St. Louis, where he is writing his dissertation on incivility in social media during the 2016 presidential election. Eric earned his M.A. in political science from University of Missouri – St. Louis, his M.B.A. from Lindenwood University, and his B.A. in English Literature and Philosophy from Central Missouri State University. His research interests include political communication and behavior, network analysis, and American political development. Eric lives in the St. Louis area with his wife and two children, aged 3 and 5.

Tell us about how you are using this technique in your research.

Vorst: A main focus of my research involves examining how incivility manifests itself in social media. I’ve looked at this question in some recent conference papers and it serves as the core of my dissertation, which draws upon a data set of approximately 9,000,000 tweets I’ve collected on a daily basis since August, 2015.

I first measure how the use of affective language and extremely uncivil words fluctuates with proximity to a political event. Next, I analyze network metrics and use visualization tools to observe how neighborhoods of discussions form around messages of different types and with different tones. This type of approach helps to illustrate the reach and impact incivility has in social media while shedding some light on possible relationships between elite and mass polarization. I’m excited to have made a few findings that challenge some of the conventional wisdom regarding the negative impact of incivility online.

I’m also applying these methods to study live Twitter streams during the 2016 presidential debates. It’s a lot of fun being able to collect data, compile it, analyze it, and present it to the public in a matter of minutes.

Network Analysis of #APSA2016 for Entire Conference:

What are some potential areas where this would have an impact?

Vorst: This type of analysis is primarily about relationships between people and groups, which is a characteristic that makes it especially useful in political science. Specifically, it allows us to identify patterns in the types of discussion occurring within social networks and to observe structural characteristics of the resulting neighborhoods they form. The exciting part comes when we take into consideration the influence of stimuli external to the social network, as this allows us to draw causal inferences regarding how systems of political communication evolve in response to political events. This is a major underlying theme in my dissertation and serves as the jumping off point for several of my current research projects.

Basic Network Map of #APSA2016 for the entire conference (3 different zoom levels):

Vorst: I attended the 2016 American Political Science Association Annual Meeting as a first-time attendee and a first-time presenter, and really wanted to make the most out of the opportunity I was being given to share my research with our community. Late on the first night of the conference, I was sitting at the desk in my hotel room thinking of ways I could incorporate some additional interactive elements into my iPoster presentation. However, I was running into some problems when trying to integrate these changes in a way that worked smoothly.

After few minutes of brainstorming, the realization struck me: I was sitting smack-dab in the middle of the perfect natural experiment. Why not perform a live analysis of what political scientists talk about at a political science convention? I thought this would be a great way to track different themes and emerging topics on each day of the conference, as well as for the conference as a whole.

I also wanted to make the findings informative, accessible, and timely, so I created YouTube videos detailing my analyses each evening. This made for several consecutive late nights and early mornings, but in the end I feel the results were well worth the effort.

Vorst: One especially surprising finding involved how the #APSA2016 network treated political punditry. Specifically, tweets with politicized content tended to occupy peripheral areas of the social network. It’s important to note that this does not necessarily indicate such activity was viewed in a substantively negative light. Rather, it merely suggests that these sorts of discussion did not permeate deeply into the network and, in turn, were less influential when compared to other types of discussions.

It’s also critical to stress that this sort of analysis is non-deterministic. Rather, it’s based largely upon relationships and, more importantly, the power of strong, interconnected, and influential relationships within a defined system. These sorts of influential relationships were seen consistently around two popular themes of discussion during the conference involving @womenalsoknow and @monkeycageblog.

Vorst: Social media analysis doesn’t just require us to ask new questions, it requires us to ask questions in new ways. I believe this opens up a great deal of creative possibilities that, if pursued with sufficient academic rigor, have the potential to establish a valuable beachhead in the study of contemporary political communication. I am honored to be part of a community of scientists from a variety of disciplines who are forging new ground in the pursuit of better understanding the role social media plays in shaping the way people engage in the political process. I’m very optimistic and excited about what the near future holds for this emerging subfield.

I hope my work can provide positive motivation for others like me, who may be working with limited resources in the form of funding and computing power. I believe there is significant value in looking at things from an alternative perspective, pursuing good questions, and being creative with your available tools. I also believe such an approach often plays a big role in creating opportunities for new discoveries. If you feel inspired by an interesting idea, why not just dive in and see where it takes you?

From speaking to community groups to liaising with the media and briefing policymakers, political scientists share their work with non-academic audiences in diverse ways. In this new interview series from APSA’s Public Engagement Program, APSA members discuss how and why they engage in the public arena and offer their tips for successful engagement. For more information, including resources on engagement and a sign-up sheet for APSA’s Experts Database, visit the APSA Public Engagement Program home page.

Melissa K. Miller, Ph.D.
Bowling Green State University

Melissa Miller is an associate professor of political science at Bowling Green State University. Dr. Miller is an expert on American politics with a specific focus on elections and voting behavior, women in American politics, public opinion, and the media. She teaches courses in American Government, Political Parties, Voter Behavior, Women in American Politics, and Research Methods. Dr. Miller holds an A.B. from Cornell University, where she majored in Government; a Master in Public Policy from Harvard University, where her concentration was Press, Politics & Public Policy; and a PhD in Political Science from Northwestern University.

In what ways do you engage in the public arena? Share some background on the different public engagement activities you’ve carried out.

Dr. Miller: Media interviews are my most frequent form of public engagement. This no doubt stems from the fact that I live and work in Ohio, where I study and teach American politics with an emphasis on voter behavior, political parties, and gender. Thanks to Ohio’s status as a key battleground state in presidential elections, my public engagement spikes every four years like clockwork.

I have never thought of myself as a thrill-seeker, but live television and radio are my favorite mediums for public engagement. I relish the challenge of having one chance to state things clearly and succinctly on live television. In the 2016 election cycle I have provided live, on-air analysis of presidential primaries and caucuses, the Democratic and Republican national conventions, and the presidential debates.

Live radio presents a different challenge: taking calls from listeners. My approach is to treat radio listeners as I would my students. I am gratified when my remarks have piqued their interest, so I treat listeners’ questions with respect and acknowledge when they add insight to the discussion or introduce an important perspective heretofore ignored in the conversation.

Interviews with the print media are rewarding in a different way. They allow for fuller exposition of a topic in what can often become a conversation with a reporter. While a 20-minute interview with a print journalist may or may not result in lengthy quotations in print, I often find that such interviews give me a chance to elaborate on a topic that inevitably comes up during a subsequent class or, often, subsequent interview.

…I approach my public engagement as an extension of my teaching: my goal is to illuminate an issue so that viewers, listeners, readers, and students can make a more informed choice or hold a more educated opinion – not adhere to my particular political viewpoint.” – Dr. Miller

In 2016, I have begun experimenting with the op-ed format. Together with my friend and colleague, Sam Nelson of Cornell University, I have co-authored two op-eds published online by CNN Opinion. The firstwas published during the 2016 presidential primary season and took on the myth that style trumps substance in presidential debates. The second was published shortly after NBC anchor Matt Lauer was widely panned as moderator of the “Commander in Chief Forum.” Sam and I argued that the moderator role should be significantly limited beginning in 2020. Compared with being interviewed on each topic, the op-ed format allowed us to provide an extended discussion and argument, and each was read by a wide, national audience.

Most recently, I initiated a weekly podcast on the 2016 presidential election featuring faculty from the Political Science Department at Bowling Green State University. “Battleground Ohio: Assessing the 2016 Presidential Race” is available on ITunes and is a collaborative project of our American Politics faculty. The project spans the 9-week period between Labor Day and November 8. Each podcast addresses a discreet, election-related topic on which we have expertise. The fact that the podcast is recorded on the campus of Bowling Green State University – situated in a swing county within a swing state – gives us a unique vantage point from which to assess the race.

Why do you engage? What motivates your public engagement activities?

Dr. Miller: Turn on cable news on any given night and you will most likely be confronted with dueling partisans battling it out on panels that weigh in on the latest political developments. Opinion seems to dominate cable news coverage – not to mention Twitter, social media, and increasingly, America’s print and online media. Thus I consider it a privilege to offer insight to the broad public based on my scholarship and study.

The more you can efficiently link your public engagement workto your research, teaching and service, the better.” – Dr. Miller

As political scientists, our value added is precisely the research and scholarship – rather than partisan orthodoxy – on which our views are based. Sharing such knowledge can elevate public discourse and understanding of critical issues. Viewers, readers, and listeners in the media landscape recognize the difference. I am often struck by how many people – neighbors, acquaintances, and even complete strangers – remark on the unbiased nature of my contributions in the media. This stems not from any lack of partisanship or strong political opinions on my part, believe me, but from the fact that I wear my proverbial “political scientist hat” when faced with a question from a TV, radio, or print reporter. In this way, I approach my public engagement as an extension of my teaching: my goal is to illuminate an issue so that viewers, listeners, readers, and students can make a more informed choice or hold a more educated opinion – not adhere to my particular political viewpoint.

As a scholar at a public university, I also feel especially obliged to engage with the public through public talks and media interviews. I am fully aware (and often concerned) that elected officials sometimes question the value of our work. Demonstrating the real-world applications of political science is important to build both public and public-sector appreciation for our important contributions, both on-campus and off.

What tips would you offer to other scholars interested in becoming more actively involved in public engagement?

Dr. Miller: As someone who feels strongly that scholars should engage with the public, I was lucky to have public engagement find me, rather than having to seek it myself. The year was 2007, when the U.S. Representative for Ohio’s Fifth Congressional District suddenly died in office, necessitating an unusual, off-year, special election. Fox News was the first to call the department for an expert to weigh in on the race, and I happened to be standing next to the secretary’s desk at the time.

My initial foray in the media may have been happenstance, but its longevity probably stems from the lessons I quickly learned in 2007 – lessons which are reinforced every four years when Ohio’s battleground state status once again draws the media to the Buckeye State and my office.

Time is of the essence. Academics tend to take the long view when it comes to research and scholarship – an approach that is anathema in the news business. For the media, quick turn-around is essential, so responding quickly and enthusiastically to interview requests tends to be rewarded.

Know what you’re going to say. Never be embarrassed about asking for the general topic and questions in advance of a media interview. After all, TV reporters want guests to appear comfortable and prepared on camera. Print reporters would prefer not to waste their time with a source who lacks detailed knowledge of the topic at hand. Knowing the topic and general questions in advance also allows you to gather pertinent information and prepare talking points. Just 15-20 minutes of preparation to organize your thoughts can make the difference between an effective interview full of substance and insight, and one that lacks clarity and focus.

Embrace the sound of the sound bite. Academics, including myself, often lament the “sound bite” nature of the news. After all, we deal in books, chapters, footnotes, and citations – not 30-second sound bites. But the reality is that journalists are looking for sources ready with pithy, quotable insights that shed light on breaking news in a compelling and easy to comprehend manner. Academics may lend gravitas to a news broadcast, but holding forth at length only guarantees fewer interview requests in the future. In academic parlance, provide the abstract, not the dissertation.

Find synergies between your media work and your scholarship, teaching and service. Look for ways to get extra mileage out of the time you put into media interviews. If you’ve done several media interviews on the topic of immigration reform, chances are you could prepare a 35-minute talk on the subject for the local chapter of the League of Women Voters or a brief lecture on the topic for your introductory or upper-division political science course. The more you can efficiently link your public engagement work to your research, teaching and service, the better.

Political Scientists Elevate Data on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders

In many circles (not Political Science!) conversations about data induce glazed eyes and a sudden interest in the latest entertainment news on cell phone screens. But for Asian American and Pacific Islander communities, discussions about data have become a call to political arms, at times a site of deep intracommunity conflict, and forced reevaluation of what representation means in our multiracial society.

These themes were clearly present at a recent convening co-sponsored by the White House Initiative on Asian Pacific Islanders (WHIAAPI) and AAPIData. The latter is an online data repository founded and directed by Political Scientist Karthick Ramakrishnan (UC Riverside). Together, these two organizations sponsored “Elevate: A Data Challenge to Elevate AAPI Data,” a national, open competition to elevate data on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. There were more than 50 entries and each was judged on a range of criteria, from appropriateness of analytic approach to visual appeal.

Though Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders are the fastest growing racial group in the United States, government data on this group are scarce and often of questionable quality because data collection tools often miss those who are Asian-language dominant.”

On Friday, October 6, in Washington, D.C., contestants, WHIAAPI staff, representatives from government agencies, such as the Department of Transportation, the Census, and HUD, as well as academics, journalists, non-profit leaders and staff, and other stakeholders watched presentations by contestants and participated in panel discussions. Contestants included high school student Jason Fong, who presented data on college admissions to support race-conscious admissions policies to Charmaine Runes, of the Urban Institute, who emphasized the importance of stories and compelling infographics with her data on “disconnected” Southeast Asian youth, Christina Phang from Blue Raster, a GIS analyst, who presented a stunning set of easy-to-read maps that highlighted the impact of Section 203, the language access provisions of the Voting Rights Act.

Why so much interest in data in the Asian American and Pacific Islander community? Data, particularly data that allow for the disaggregation of specific national origin groups, has been at the heart of the community’s quest for political representation and visibility in public policy-making. Though Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders are the fastest growing racial group in the United States, government data on this group are scarce and often of questionable quality because data collection tools often miss those who are Asian-language dominant.

Perhaps more importantly, under the umbrella category of “Asian American and Pacific Islander” are more than 24 distinct national origin and ethnic groups, each with a unique immigration history, language, culture and settlement pattern in the United States. The most socioeconomically challenged are Cambodians, Hmong, Laotians, Bangladeshis, Bhutanese, and Native Hawaiian Pacific Islanders. These groups are routinely lumped in with larger groups that have benefited from selective immigration policies that render the aggregate population, particularly the largest Asian American groups – Indians, Chinese and Filipinos- among the highest educated and highest earning populations in the country. Here we see the power, and potential dangers, of data that obscures smaller Asian American and Pacific Islander groups under cover of the “Model Minority Myth.” Political will and resources must drive the data collection necessary to reveal the needs of smaller Asian American and Pacific Islander communities, many that demonstrate higher drop-out rates and poverty rates than any other racial group in the U.S. Some Asian American and Pacific Islander groups have been fighting for more than three decades to make their voices heard on the pressing topic of better data collection and data disaggregation. The convening was an opportunity to make that case again to Washington policy-makers.

Political Scientists can learn much about making their data accessible and thereby more impactful from their colleagues working at non-profits, advocacy organizations, and in the commercial vending world.”

Another important topic covered by panelists was the link between academic research and the work of those in government agencies and non-profits. Political scientists have led the effort to collect data on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders with studies like the 2001 Pilot National Asian Survey and the National Asian American Survey (fielded in 2008, 2012, 2016). These data allow us to confront popular assumptions about Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders:

Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders do not resist taxes, but embrace “Big Government” programs and spending on the Affordable Care Act and other social programs

The Asian American political agenda is much broader than education-related policies, but encompasses strong and consistent support for environmental protections and gun control

While a majority of all Asian Americans oppose a proposed ban on Muslim immigrants to the U.S., certain Asian American groups are more willing to support a proposed ban than others – notably a significant proportion of Chinese Americans support such a policy, even though historically Chinese were formally excluded from the United States themselves

At the same time, Political Scientists can learn much about making their data accessible and thereby more impactful from their colleagues working at non-profits, advocacy organizations, and in the commercial vending world.

Those at the convening have no doubt that the collection of and access to data on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders is deeply political. In California this past summer, some Chinese Americans vocally opposed legislation that would require certain educational and health agencies in California to break up demographic data for the Asian American and Pacific Islander community by ethnic and national origin subgroup. The rationale was that this disaggregated data might be used to identify Asian and Pacific Islander populations in the state that have low rates of college-going and might benefit from programs to increase their numbers in state colleges and universities. Opponents feared such programs might negatively impact Chinese American admissions advantages. Other Chinese Americans in the state, as well as long-standing civil rights organizations pressed for the bill to collect detailed data on underrepresented Asian American and Pacific Islander groups. In the end, the bill was watered down to apply to only public health agencies, though it was signed into law.

Data is not always glamorous and it certainly doesn’t capture the public imagination like a tweet from Donald Trump, but the Elevate AAPI Data Challenge was an important moment for the Asian American community because it left no doubt that without data, political representation suffers and our voices are lost.

Education and Transparency: Changes in Campus Iconography

by Dianne Pinderhughes, University of Notre Dame

Woodrow Wilson’s standing has been widely recognized and honored in academic and public life. He was the APSA’s sixth President, 1909–1910, while he was President of Princeton University, and he was U.S. President 1913–1921. The charge for the APSA’s Woodrow Wilson Award, created in 1947 specifies: “The Woodrow Wilson Award is given annually for the best book on government, politics, or international affairs. The award, formerly supported by the Woodrow Wilson Foundation, is sponsored by Princeton University. It carries a cash prize of $5,000.” 1 Princeton University created “the School of Public and International Affairs” in 1930, and in 1948 when “a graduate professional program was added, the School was renamed to honor Woodrow Wilson, who served as the 13th President of Princeton University, governor of New Jersey and 28th president of the United States.” 2 Other major national institutions have been created, including the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, in Washington, D.C., which hosts visiting scholars, and serves as “the official memorial to President Woodrow Wilson…” It is “the nation’s key non-partisan policy forum for tackling global issues through independent research and open dialogue….”

The invitation to write a short essay on the recent call by student members of the Black Justice League to remove Wilson’s name from various Princeton institutions was extended to “a wide range of colleagues whose views on this issue will interest our readers.” I willingly accepted this invitation to comment on this controversial request. The idea is not limited to Wilson and Princeton University as a number of Universities and Colleges, states and local governments have been called upon to change their names, and divest themselves of their current identities, flags, colors, namesakes. At Yale, students have challenged the name of Calhoun College, a residential College named after John Calhoun, South Carolina Senator, Vice President, Secretary of State and strong defender of slavery. Yale’s President Peter Salovey greeted last Fall’s 2015 freshman class with a call to “have a thoughtful and public discussion of what we ought to do” 5 The conversation is still underway although a portrait of Calhoun was removed from the College dining room in January of this year.